Unit Poetry

Strategy from Atwell:

1. Have the students read the poem individual
2. Read the poem aloud to the class
3. separate into groups and discuss
   • how the poem makes you feel
   • what is your favorite part
   • what do you notice
   • how does the poet feel
   • why is the poet writing
   • how else could this poem be titled
   • what is the poem saying
   • what lines trigger your senses
   • what lines confuse you
   • are there metaphors
   • what is the most important line in the poem
   • how does this poem relate to the industrial revolution
4. Write a collaborative poem in response to original poem

The Chimney Sweeper: When my mother died I was very young

By William Blake
When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry " 'weep! 'weep! 'weep! 'weep!"
So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head
That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved, so I said,
"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head's bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."

And so he was quiet, & that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping he had such a sight!
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, & Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black;

And by came an Angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins & set them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run,
And wash in a river and shine in the Sun.

Then naked & white, all their bags left behind,
They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind.
And the Angel told Tom, if he'd be a good boy,
He'd have God for his father & never want joy.

And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm;
So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.